


Bird in Hand

by erwneoten



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Laurent is enslaved and sent to Akeilos, M/M, Non-Consensual Hand Kissing, POV Laurent, Slavery, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-28
Updated: 2016-12-17
Packaged: 2018-07-18 18:59:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7326490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/erwneoten/pseuds/erwneoten
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Laurent must make a very pretty picture, trussed up like a palace pet fresh for the taking in the middle of the Akielon court. And, of course, because this is the final move of a sadistic chessmaster, Damianos is there. Prince-killer, gazing appraisingly upon him as he would regard a fine cut of meat.</p><p>(In the wake of his uncle's coup, Laurent is sent to Akeilos as a bed slave)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Warning for potential triggers! (On top of those already present in canon)
> 
> Laurent WILL NOT be raped in this story. Damen is a decent human being and does not rape or attempt rape, or do anything beyond making flirtatious comments before he realizes how much grief they cause Laurent. 
> 
> HOWEVER that does not stop Laurent from catastophizing the situation and imagining scenarios in which he is raped (never in graphic detail), and generally being viscerally anxious about everything that's happening to him.
> 
> If this sounds like something that might bother you, you may want to skip out (or if you're not sure, message me and I'd be happy to give more details)
> 
> Otherwise happy reading!!!

Laurent supposes he shouldn't be surprised.

More than that, he mentally disparages himself for being so naive as to be surprised, for not seeing the change in his guard, the drug in his water, the vicious bearded grin looming familiar over him as he’d struggled, and failed, to retain consciousness. He didn't think it would come to this, or perhaps he’d _hoped_ that it _couldn't_ , that somewhere in his uncle there still existed a tiny kernel of love for his only remaining family that could somehow overpower the raw, ruthless ambition long enough to save Laurent's skin. But no.

Perhaps disparaging himself is easier than dealing with the situation at hand, the masterfully cruel crescendo in his uncle's grand symphony against him. Assassination would have been kinder.

The past few days (weeks? Months? He has no concept of how long he's been out) are a blur of rough hands and chains and groggy darkness, and, chillingly, seasickness. He cannot remember eating, though he must have if he's survived this long, his stomach an acidic tangle of bile and nerves. His every joint aches, back knotted and sore even as he holds it straight and proud on will alone. His skin remains unbruised, remarkably and perhaps damningly; his uncle, knowing the fate he intended for his beloved nephew,must have instructed whoever had been manhandling him to not leave any marks.

Laurent must make a very pretty picture, then, trussed up like a palace pet fresh for the taking in the middle of the Akielon court. And, of course, because this is the final move of a sadistic chessmaster, Damianos is there. Prince-killer, gazing appraisingly upon him as he would regard a fine cut of meat.

Laurent, practiced at this by now, fights the tide of panic rising in him and straightens, channeling all his fear and rage into the cold fire of his gaze. Outside he is steel, polished to a mirror shine; the only hint of the weakness within is the pounding of his pulse, sparrow-quick.

Damianos’s eyes rove openly over his body, and the sourness in his throat turns from anxiety to revulsion. They go first to his hair, gold on its own and woven into delicate braids with strings of sapphires to accent the blue of his eyes. His face is painted, indigo at his eyes and gold for his lips, and rouge across the sharp lines of his cheekbones, giving him a breathless child’s flush of color where he'd otherwise be pallid from weakness and ashen from distaste.

The brute’s dark eyes linger briefly at the jeweled collar that lies at his throat, a delicate gold chain linking it to similar cuffs around his wrists, bound behind his back. Laurent has no doubt he could snap it easily; such a thing is more for symbolism than for actual restraint, but between the prince and his guards lining the stark white marble walls of the viewing chamber, doing so would do him no benefit here, as momentarily satisfying as it might feel. His best bet is to play the part of the demure palace flower, for now.

“He is very beautiful, isn't he?” Damianos approaches easily and runs bronze fingers along the strong line of Laurent's jaw, and he suddenly finds it very difficult to be anything resembling demure.

He snaps his head away on instinct, expression aghast for just a moment before he can school it into something colder. He scolds himself, internally-- stupid, weak, how can you expect to escape from here if you can't even lie to these barbarians-- he expects hands to seize him and drag him to the dungeons, force him into submission, a slap across the face at least. But when he musters enough courage to look up, he only finds Damianos gazing down at him, expression one of mild confusion.

Of course, he is a spoiled playboy prince, Laurent thinks, disgust once again knotting in his stomach, he has never been refused in his life and is unsure how to handle it. Fighting bile, Laurent forces himself to unknit his brow and soften his lips, and cast his eyes down to the floor as an Akielon slave would-- in submission.

Damianos does not try touching him again. Instead, “You said he is intended as a gift for my bed?” The sound of Veretian words in the rough Akielon accent grates at Laurent's ears. That his uncle had him made a bed slave, he could guess-- he is much more interested in the how of it. He keeps his head down, and keeps listening.

“That is correct, yes,” comes a sniveling Veretian response. Guion, of course, always his uncle's snake. Laurent makes a note to have him beheaded the moment he is able to return to Vere. “His majesty, King of Vere, has heard of your specific tastes and wished to send him as a gesture of peace. In the wake of the tragic death of our crown prince, he wishes that his first act as King be to re-establish diplomatic ties lost to Prince Laurent's petty prejudices.”

It is all Laurent can do to keep himself from letting out a barking laugh in Guion’s face, and he's very proud when he manages to keep his expression level. So his uncle faked his nephew's death, and instead sent him here in secret, to be raped by the man he despises most, simultaneously strengthening his own position and further destroying any remaining shreds of Laurent's wellbeing. If he were not in the middle of it, he might have to admire the ingenious depravity of the whole thing, as one admires a boar goring a hunter.

“You'll find him to be quite proficient in the bedroom, very submissive to his betters if properly commanded,” Guion continues, and Laurent offhandedly wonders if he could snap the chain and wring the councilman’s neck before he was stopped by the guards. He is certain he is blushing furiously, beneath the rouge, and he hates himself for it. “Outside the bedroom, you may find him lacking in manners, but I have been assured his skills are well worth enduring his demeanor, and that you may find an enjoyable challenge in bringing him to heel.”

Laurent can picture perfectly his uncle's expression of relish as he wrote the missive that Guion now delivers, one hand around his cock perhaps, and his stomach turns at the thought. Damianos answers with a grunt, only half-listening, and Laurent is certain that if he were to look up he'd find the prince's brown eyes roving hungrily over his body, and that turns his stomach too.

“Gift, what is your name?”

It takes Laurent a moment to realize the question is directed to him, and when he does it makes his blood boil. He cannot tell the truth, of course; Crown Prince Laurent, rightful heir of Vere, is dead, and he'd be labeled mad for claiming such an identity. And if miraculously the barbarians  did believe him, he'd be locked away as a hostage under full guard night and day. Far better to endure as a harmless pleasure slave for a greater chance of escape. Truth is out of the question.

Another suggestion comes to him, unbidden, foolish perhaps, but he has been drugged and chained and touched and dragged thousands of miles from home, into his own personal hell, and after all that he does not have the strength to resist the lure of petty pleasures.

Laurent looks Damianos in the eye, blue meeting brown, and states clearly, “My name is Auguste.”

Strategy be damned, the look on Damianos’s face is worth it, the shock, the sudden unsure look in his eyes, as if confronted with something unpleasant; he knows exactly what sort of monster he is, knows what he has done, the suffering he has caused. Laurent will savor this expression, he thinks, this astonishment and discomfort and _guilt_ plastered over the Prince-killer’s face, and the memory of it will be his guiding star when the prince fucks him, his comfort.

Not wishing to put himself at a complete disadvantage, however, he drops his gaze, once again the picture of a shrinking pleasure pet. “I understand if my given name might upset you, however, and have been told that you may rename me as you please, m’lord.”

Damianos, unskilled at both subtlety and statecraft, does not make any effort to school his expression into something more neutral to hide his discomfort, letting it show plainly across his face, and Laurent relishes that too. Small victories. Now even when Damianos bestows a new name upon him, undoubtedly some diminutive pet name in barbaric Akielon, even if he decides Laurent is not deserving of a name at all, somewhere in his subconscious he will be reminded of his crimes.

“Is Auguste a common name, in Vere?”

The tone of the question is not outwardly disdainful or accusatory, as Laurent expects, but seeking understanding, which is why Laurent again takes a moment to realize it’s directed at him (by now, the prince must think him either simple or hard of hearing, both of which might be an advantage). He takes another moment to think of a response, to formulate the bluff completely in his mind.

“It’s considered lucky to name a child after royalty, or at least fashionable in some circles,” he says, voice reticent. And then, because he feels like tempting fate, “Unfortunately, it did not seem to bring the prince a terrible amount of luck, nor has it brought me any, as m’lord can see.”

A furious blush creeps over Damianos’s face, which is something Laurent absolutely did not expect, so much that he has to make an effort not to let his jaw drop. He is grinning, though, and not the sort of grin one adopts when about to do something cruel, not the grin his uncle had worn as consciousness fled Laurent's grasp, and so Laurent assumes he hasn’t offended the barbarian prince enough to get himself beheaded, yet.

“You were not joking about his demeanor, Guion, he certainly has a mouth on him.” He says it almost affectionately, which nauseates Laurent to an illogical degree. “Akielon slaves are trained to be perfectly submissive in all that they do, and the palace slaves more than most. He will make a nice change of pace.”

Tentatively, Damianos reaches his hand out again, this time to touch the top of Laurent's head, rather than his jaw, and this time, prepared for it, he endures the brute’s fingers leafing gently through his hair. Not unlike the touch one might use to settle a spooked horse, Laurent bitterly notes. “Really, I find him quite charming, mouth and all. I will have to send my heartfelt thanks to the King of Vere for such a thoughtful gift.”

“We are most pleased you find the gift adequate, your grace,” Guion says with undisguised pride, perhaps to hide the smug satisfaction of getting away with all this. Laurent will be sure to kill him, slowly, whether he manages to reclaim his throne or not. “I will certainly carry word of your appreciation back to the King of Vere, when I return. He will be overjoyed to hear it, I'm sure.”

Overjoyed to hear his troublesome nephew will be out of his hair and into Damianos’s bed for the foreseeable future, until he inevitably runs his mouth and gets himself brutally executed. Overjoyed to be able to pleasure himself to the thought of his former pet skewered on the cock of the man who killed his brother… Laurent very deliberately quashes the rise of panic in his chest; it will only cloud his judgement further, make it harder for him to think his way out.

And then Damianos trails his fingers affectionately down Laurent's cheek and takes up the chain around his neck, “Come now, Auguste, I'd like to retire and see what else your clever mouth can do.”

All hopes of rational thought are lost to the wind.

His limbs are numb, his thoughts numb, but he must be moving because there is no tug at his leash as Damianos bids Guion farewell leads him through the palace, marble floors cold as they pass under his bare feet. Somewhere, in some corner of his mind yet-unclaimed by the looming threat of Damianos face-fucking him, he thinks he should be memorizing the route, counting doors, looking for servants, something-- _you are Auguste now, after all, you should be stronger than this_. It would prove a nice distraction, at the very least, from the suffocating anxiety that's slowly consuming him, but Laurent is not strong at all, and can't push through it long enough to do anything useful, anything but follow blindly and obediently behind the prince-killer.

He's more than a little nauseated by the time Damianos leads him into his chambers, and Laurent briefly entertains the idea of throwing up over the prince’s ridiculous sandals and earning himself a swift death.

Damianos, fortunately, is cluelessly unobservant and pays him little mind beyond casting warm, longing glances over his shoulder. “Wash your face of paint, then come attend me,” he speaks easily to Laurent, who does as bid, infinitely grateful for the chance for a moment alone. He waits for his leash to be unclipped, and then lowers his head in obeisance and wordlessly makes for the prince's baths.

Once the door is shut behind him, all pretense of calm is lost, and he barely keeps himself standing, knuckles going white as he grips the washbasin. He splashes his face with water and tries to regulate his breathing, tries to calm himself down. There is a small window carved into the wall, above the basin, if he could just--

No, says what small rational portion of his brain remains, it is too much of a risk and you will be caught and questioned and killed, and stubbornly, Laurent heeds it. _You will endure_ , he murmurs to himself in Veretian, voice barely a whisper. _It is nothing you have not already endured._

He splashes his face with more water, and feels his breath slow to a numb calm, like the eye of a hurricane. In the mirror, he can see the indigo paint running in ugly blue-black rivulets down his cheeks, and fetches one of Damianos's pristine white hand towels to spitefully ruin, dabbing at it. Without the rouge his skin is ghostly and sick, the indigo residue sticking in the puffy half-moons beneath his eyes in a way that makes him look more a blonde skeleton than a person, which is how he feels, anyway. This, too, he embraces with spiteful glee; if Damianos wishes to pretend he is not bedding a painted slave, he can embrace the reality of all Laurent has suffered to become one.

He adjusts the scant silks that have been wrapped around him under the pretense of _clothing_ , draped over only one shoulder so that his left nipple is peaked in exposure and leaving bare all but the very tops of his thighs, and sheer enough that they almost do not matter, anyway. The barrier of his austere court clothing is a luxury he had never fully appreciated back home, and might never experience again, sentenced forever to be left nude and vulnerable at the slightest breeze, or the momentary whim of a drunken soldier. His hair, at least, remains tied up and tightly braided; this still is a part of himself he can keep hidden, he thinks as he smooths it with water and adjusts the sapphires, a part of himself that remains under his own control. At least until Damianos tugs it free, mid-fuck, to have something to grip him by.

Laurent then stands in the mirror breathing deliberately, willing himself to accept what is coming to him, accept this horrible fate, and it is a long time before he can gather the courage to open the door and return to the bedroom.

When he does, Damianos's face falls almost immediately with some unknown displeasure, and Laurent briefly imagines his own head on a pike outside the palace with perhaps more relief than he ought to.

“You look terrible,” stupid, tactless Damianos says, surprised.

“Thank you, m’lord,” Laurent responds in kind, flashing his teeth like a threatened animal. Startlingly, this seems to spark some small mote of realization in the prince, who smiles in apology.

“I mean that you are as fair and exquisite to behold as an exotic bird from beyond the seas, a beauty from the legends come to life,” he says with an infuriating laugh. “But you look half-dead, beneath your jewels, and exhausted besides.”

“My apologies, m’lord.” Evenly.

“It's nothing to be sorry for, Auguste, it only means I ought to finish with you earlier, tonight, and let you sleep later tomorrow,” he says casually as discussing the weather, oblivious to the chill he sends running down Laurent's spine. “And you may call me Damen in private, if you'd like.”

That, irrationally, prickles him, enough that his all-consuming dread is momentarily displaced. “M’lord,” _I will never call you Damen, you are a monster and you killed my brother,_ “I wouldn't want to inconvenience you with my own weaknesses. They sent me all this way so that you might fuck me, after all.”

He tries to keep the ice from his voice, he really does, but iron-willed self-control is all that's keeping him standing at this point and he hasn't any to spare on niceties.

Damianos takes notice, this time, dark brows lifting in perplexed surprise, like a dog's. “You are nervous?”

It isn't a question. Damianos is looking at him with a damnable knowing smile that only spreads as Laurent struggles to come up with an appropriate response. He doesn't get the chance.

“Are you a virgin?” And then when Laurent is too dumbstruck to answer, “it's alright; while Vere might prize experienced courtesans, in Akeilos a slave’s First Night is something to be treasured. A fine gift for the crown prince.”

Laurent stares at Damianos’s warm, broad grin until it occurs to him that the words are intended as a comfort to him. “I am not,” he forces through teeth grit so tight he thinks he might shatter his jaw. “A virgin.”

“Then you've little to be nervous over, sweetheart. The ambassador was quick to praise your experience.” With a lazy gesture of one massive hand, he beckons Laurent over to where he sits on the bed in the center of the room. Laurent approaches with feet made of lead. “Come, lie beside to me and tell me of your training. Surely that will rekindle your confidence.”

“I have no training, m’lord,” Laurent blurts out, and immediately curses himself for not lying. And then a darker thought emerges, _that was a lie_. Damianos remains undeterred; blatant, gut-twisting affection in his gaze as Laurent seats himself gingerly on the bed beside the prince.

“So the King of Vere selects the most beautiful man in his kingdom to send to my bed, without bothering to train him first? He seemed very sure of your skills, for one untested.” His voice is kept light, but there can be no mistaking the question in it. Laurent struggles for a moment, to fathom some explanation, a story that will make sense and stop this man's fond needling questions.

What comes to his mind is the truth.

“The King of Vere has experienced my skills personally, m’lord.”

Damianos’s response is quiet surprise, tilting his head to give Laurent a strange look, and this time Laurent really does think he might be executed for the offense. No prince would willingly play sloppy second to an enemy king.

But Damianos only reaches out to loop an unwelcome arm around Laurent's shoulder, drawing him near enough that he can feel the man's unbearable warmth. He tenses immediately, heart hammering, but Damianos keeps his voice soft and even, “Then what has you so nervous, dear Auguste, if you have served royalty in bed before? Was he such a good lover that you're concerned I won't compare?”

Before he can stop himself Laurent lets out a loud derisive snort, and Damianos responds with a wry grin. “A poor lover then, and you're concerned I'll be the same? Because I can assure you, I am quite renowned--”

He trails off as he sees the look Laurent can't keep from his face, a look in his blue eyes that could cut glass and mouth drawn hard and thin and flat. The grin fades off Damianos’s face, his dark brows softening. “A very poor lover, then?”

When Laurent does not respond, a trickle of concern, impossibly, works it's way into the expression Damianos gives him. “Auguste,” he murmurs, impossibly infuriatingly tender, trailing a fond, gentle finger down the plane of Laurent's cheek that Laurent is too numb to shy away from. The gesture is just another question, couched in the cloying mannerisms of a concerned lover, a demand for Laurent to open himself and spill answers, to make sense for the brute of why he is so broken.

He ought to have come up with a better lie in the first place. With a lie at all. He sucks in a breath.

“When I was thirteen, my family died,” he says, and then pauses. This is the closest he's ever been to letting the truth slip from his lips, and the prospect of it is dizzying. “I was left with very few options. The Regent of Vere, who is now the King, took me into his bed, as a pet. He--” _He told me I was a beautiful boy, that he could not resist me, that this is what men do, when they are in love, and didn't I want to be a man?_ “Showered me in affection for three years, before promptly abandoning me when I grew too old for his tastes. I remained at court, which he apparently resented enough to send me away at the first opportunity. That is what has me so nervous.”

Damianos is silent for a very long time, his grin long-since faded, expression not unlike the one he had worn when Laurent had first lied about his name. Uncomfortable. Laurent does not relish this expression.

“You were thirteen, when he took you into his bed?”

“Yes.”

Another pause. Laurent waits to be thrown from the room in disgust. Perhaps sent to be a kitchen or stable slave, where at least it will be easier to escape. Perhaps publicly executed, as a warning to Vere against sending southward as gifts the dregs of their king’s bed.

Neither happens. Damianos’s grim look lingers, and Laurent nearly wretches as he realizes that it's pity. He finds he feels rather like Auguste might have, prone and cut open before this brute, bleeding out at his mercy, except Laurent has impaled himself upon his own sword, here, and his death will not be swift.

“In Akeilos,” he begins, slowly, as if Laurent were some skittish woodland creature that might dart away in fright at the wrong word, “Slaves exchange freedom for perfect treatment. They are trained from the time they are young, but do not serve masters until they have blossomed fully into maturity. There is as little honor in harming a slave as there is a child, as there is any innocent who cannot fight back.”

Laurent lets his eyes fall closed, inhaling deeply to smother the violence rising in him, the urge to wipe that look of pity from Damianos’s face. It is not what he wants to hear; he is not some shrinking palace slave who would bear his neck willingly to the sword if ordered. Laurent can fight back-- has been fighting, his whole life, against monsters this spoiled prince could never _dream_ of.

“Auguste,” Damianos says as he reaches out to cup Laurent's cheek, and the tenderness in his voice and his touch makes Laurent's skin crawl. “Know that I would not hurt you, as you have been hurt in Vere. You are the most beautiful creature I have set my eyes upon, and I would very much like to take you to bed, to pleasure you and take pleasure from you, slow and tender until we are both spent,”

Laurent feels as though he's choking on his own breath, and keeps his body deathly still for fear that any movement will turn into a flinch. _You are Auguste, now, you must endure._

“...but I could not, not when it is so clear how much pain the very idea brings to you.”

He releases his held breath, all at once so that it sound half a barking laugh, like his very being is deflating, and suddenly the task of holding his back straight and shoulders strong is an insurmountable challenge. Damianos's soft smile makes him want to vomit.

“You are Damianos, Crown Prince of Akielos, and you may bed who you wish,” he says, not quite keeping the vitriol from his voice. How fortunate that the crown prince is also an idiot. “The whims of bed slaves are no object to you. Your Highness.”

The vitriol serves only to make the brute smile wider, Laurent notes with exasperation, as another affectionate finger ghosts across his cheek, nearly startling him with its gentleness. “My wish, as Crown Prince of Akielos, is for my bed slaves to be comfortable and content, well-kept and well-tumbled.” Damianos smirks at his own joke, and Laurent becomes more exasperated than he knew was possible. “My wish is to spend the night admiring you at arm’s length, basking in your wit and beauty, and for you to eat, and to rest, and to feel safe as you have not yet felt here. And then, when you wish to be bedded, to bed you.”

“And if I never wish to be bedded?” Laurent snaps back, shaking off the prince’s hand before he can stop himself. Damianos is aggravatingly unaffected. “If the possibility emerges that you might never get to enjoy all the _proficiencies_ of your fine Veretian gift?”

“Then I shall continue admiring you at arm's length, and basking in your wit and beauty.” He pauses a moment, considering. “And I would perhaps mourn the evenings we could have spent tangled in each other's arms. But I told you, I would not hurt you as you have been hurt. I am a kinder man than the King of Vere.”

 _You are just as guilty as he is; everything he's done was because you allowed it to happen_ . Laurent chews over words on his tongue, trying to decide the best way to respond to the idiot prince and coming up at a loss. Arguing back, calling his bluff could only result in Damianos changing his mind and deciding it isn't worth waiting for Laurent to _want_ it, and after all he's suffered already he would rather be unmolested than right. If the brute wishes to pretend to be a kind and thoughtful slavemaster, then Laurent has no qualms taking advantage of his arrogance.

“Very well,” he says softly, after a long moment. “I do not wish to be bedded tonight. I wish to eat, and to rest.” And then, because he is drunk on his own daring, “And I wish not to be touched.”

Damianos laughs, and then, astoundingly, gives Laurent's shoulder a loving squeeze before removing his arm from around it, so that a cool nine-inch difference separates where they sit on the bed. “I'm not sure how it is in Vere, but generally in Akeilos, the prince makes requests of the bed slave, not the other way around.”

Laurent chews at his lip. “In Vere, it becomes a game. A pet may make requests, but it is up to their master to decide whether they will be granted, and what terms will be established for granting the request.”

“So, like everything else in Vere, it is needlessly complex and wholly reliant on manipulation and subterfuge?” Damianos chuckles, oblivious to the scathing look Laurent sends him. “Very well, my terms are that you sit here with me and make conversation, until we retire for the evening.”

“Make conversation,” he says flatly.

“Talk to me, tell me about Vere. You did say you had been in court, did you not?”

Laurent feels a knife twist in his stomach, and he swallows hard. “You would have me exchange the secrets of the Veretian court to a foreign prince, in return for being treated with common decency?” It has been three long years since he's played this game, and he has forgotten not to show his cards on the first round. Perhaps Damianos is far better at deception than he initially suspected.

But no. Damianos only laughs, again, moving to clap Laurent on the shoulder before remembering himself and grinning at Laurent instead. “I meant, I wish to know more about you, my curious Veretian bed slave; I wish for you to entertain me with talk of yourself and your interests. Trust me, Auguste, I do not care a lick for the secrets of the Veretian court, though it's very Veretian of you to think so.”

That rankles Laurent like nothing the man’s said yet. In his short lifetime he's been ogled and gawked at, has been touched and taken, his body and beauty turned against him, but his mind has always been a reliable weapon that remained solely his own, his one advantage against everything he's overcome and everything that stands in his way. And now the barbarian prince asks him to put it to use as _petty entertainment._

“Very well, I accept your terms,” he pushes through grit teeth, and tries not to reason that rape might be preferable to this humiliation. “I will make polite conversation until you grow bored and order my silence, or I collapse in exhaustion. But first, I wish to eat.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “If Vere means to insult me by sending me gifts of beautiful men, then I will have no trouble at all weathering their ire,” Damianos says, in some horrendously misguided attempt to be charming.
> 
> (Prince Damianos sends for Laurent in the garden)

True to Damianos’s word, Laurent is allowed to sleep late the next morning. He wakes in the prince's bedroom, alone and blinking in the midmorning sun that streams through the prince's windows, on a slave pallet at the foot of the prince's bed. Panic momentarily overtakes him as memories trickle in, but he is clean and not sticky, and not sore in any of the places that might suggest he'd been used in his sleep. So Damianos has kept his word on that as well.

After food had arrived, the previous night, the prince had spent the night needling Laurent about the most trivial aspects of Veretian culture, in between bites of lamb and stuffed grape leaves. _Why does Vere use so many different forks? Is it true you eat frog legs? You know Akeilon slaves are trained to hand-feed their masters._ That last one, Laurent had scoffed at, catching the prince’s implications and rebuffing them; he explained that in Vere, it is pets who eat bits of food from their patrons’ fingertips, and the dawning grin that spread over Damianos’s face had been vexing.

They’d spent the rest of the night, at Damianos’s exasperatingly giddy insistence, alternatingly eating bites food from one another’s hands, until Laurent must have fallen asleep at the man’s side and been carried to bed. And now he is alone, unsullied, well-rested, and miraculously, unchained. Perhaps returning to Vere unscathed will be easier than he thought, easier than his uncle had planned for.

He goes for the window.

Predictably, Damianos’s chambers face an ocean cliffside, with a hundred-foot drop into rocks below them. Though the cliffs are mostly sheer, there are outcroppings and sewer drains further down that he could conceivably cling to, but he’d need some sort of rope to reach them first. In theory, as a palace slave, he has access to as many linens as he needs, under the pretense of cleaning the prince’s rooms. Then, it is only a matter of finding the time to twist them into a sturdy rope, perhaps to tie to the bedframe and sneak out under the cover of night. Damianos, simple brute as he is, would probably sleep right through it and he’d have ample time to get as far away as possible before--

The door to the chambers swings open, and Laurent hastily steps down from the window and tries to look as slaveish as he can manage, as if he were merely opening the windows to air the room out, rather than plotting his escape. It is not Damianos who enters, or guard or another slave, as Laurent expected. It is a noblewoman, head held high and piled with blonde curls, and an easy disdain to her brow that suggests she is familiar with these quarters.

It takes a moment, but her eyes eventually settle on Laurent with a disinterested smirk. Slowly, he lowers himself to a kneel before her, head bowed. While the idiot prince might find his insubordination amusing, he doubts the rest of Akielos will.

“Damen's new toy, are you?” she says, voice barbed and honeyed in a way that almost makes him homesick. Laurent notes her use of the diminutive Damianos had requested him to use, and coupled with the familiarity with the royal apartments, guesses her a lover. “Certainly are a pretty thing, fitted to his tastes. How very clever of Vere to send you. Come here, pet.”

He spares a glance upward and notes that the woman shares his coloring-- lithe, pale, blonde and blue-eyed. Definitely a lover, then, possibly a jealous one. That could be to his advantage, if she could be made to convince Damianos to send him away, or monopolize the prince's time so that Laurent might slip away unnoticed. He does as bid, approaching with his eyes lowered and face aggressively neutral, a picture of servile.

Her pink lips twist into a smile as she reaches a hand out to cup his jaw and tilt his head upward, gaze scrutinizing. Laurent's heart skips a beat at the touch, but he suppresses the flinch and keeps his expression even. Her smile widens.

“He won't have fucked you, then-- not if you reacted like that.” And then when Laurent does not respond, head held steadily in her grip, “Come now, after all that talk of how fractious and foul-mouthed the new Veretian bed slave is, I don't even get a witty retort for my efforts?”

“It was very kind of the prince not to rape me, yes,” he says flatly, through grit teeth. Guion would have, of course, worked to spread such a reputation for him, to ensure he'd be monitored closely. But at this point there's little to be done, and if this woman is after impertinence, Laurent will be more than happy to oblige.

She lets her gaze rove over him assessingly for a long moment, and Laurent isn't sure what she's looking for; perhaps she hadn't actually expected any lip from him, but then again, she had asked for it. She must have found something distasteful, because her fair face goes hard, very suddenly. “On your knees, slave. Kiss my foot,” as one dainty calf slides out from beneath the gossamer sheath of her dress.

It is Laurent's turn, then, to stop and stare and consider, and left without any better alternatives, he slowly drops to his knees, and then to the floor, and with shut eyes he presses a chaste kiss between the laces of her sandal, to the pale skin at the top of her foot.

He can't help but be amused as he imagines the uproarious scandal this would warrant in Vere. Icy crown prince Laurent found alone with a woman would be enough to send the council tittering; caught kissing her foot outside of marriage could be grounds for removing him from the succession-- clearly, his uncle should have just arranged such a scandal, and could have spared himself the trouble of faking his nephew's death. But he supposes this way he will be facing far bigger hurdles between him and his throne, once he's able to get home.

The woman lets out a short breath that might be a laugh and shifts her foot beneath Laurent's lips, and he pulls back, eyes lowered and waiting to see where she will take this little encounter next.

“You take surprisingly well to submission, Your Highness.”

Laurent's breath catches in his throat, though he manages to steady his exhale before it turns into a gasp. Slowly, he straightens his back and comes up off his knees, to stand before her with all the dignity his proper rank affords him, or at least what dignity can be retained when dressed in little more than a sheer bedsheet. His blue eyes meet hers dead-on; If she knows, then there is no point to keeping up this farcical slave act.

They stare at one another in silence for a long time, before Laurent musters the courage to break it. “If you know who I am, then you've revealed yourself to be complicit in what's been done to me.” It feels good to let the chill return to his voice, to speak to these barbaric people with the deserved scorn of a prince, rather than the coy snark of a palace pet. “Which means when I return to my homeland, Vere will be very, very cross with you.”

“Or, perhaps I merely put two and two together. The Veretian prince dies a year before he's meant to ascend the throne, and a week later a cantankerous bed slave with the prince’s coloring is brought to Akeilos as a gift of goodwill?” The smirk has returned, a divot at the corner of her mouth. “Fortunately for you, Damen is as unobservant as he is kind.”

“Yes, quite fortunate that the man who killed my brother prefers me wrapped around his cock, rather than being treated with honor and respect as is deserving of my status,” he says, not quite managing to keep the bitterness from his voice.

“You would not be treated with honor and respect; you would be a prisoner of war. This is the smarter option, to pretend, and whomever sent you here knows you well enough to know you'd choose it.”

“Whomever sent me here,” he chews his lip in distaste. “Am I to believe you've innocently observed that much, as well?”

The woman offers a casual, graceful shrug that Laurent recognizes as a bid for time. “I am only keeping a watchful eye out for the beloved Prince Damen, to ensure that he doesn't fall in the crossfire of Vere’s political squabbles.”

“Then why not inform _beloved_ Damianos that his new fuck toy is the dethroned prince of an enemy nation?” he pushes through grit teeth. “Seems as though it might behoove him to know, unless of course, you're holding off out of some bizarre sympathy for what might become of me should he find out.”

She snorts laughter, in response. “Damianos is a simple, honorable man. He would not respond well to the sort of subterfuge that runs beneath his father’s court.”

“And you believe that if the unthinkable can happen to one prince, it could happen to another.”

They both regard each other in pregnant silence, as Laurent reshapes his view of Akielos to accommodate this woman. She possesses the sort of underhanded cleverness that would go far in the Veretian court, excusing his uncle's distaste for women, and yet if she's to be believed, and Laurent isn't certain that she is, she intends to put her talents to the honorable and very Akielon task of loyally defending her prince.

If she is to be believed. If she is not a liar in his uncle's employ, his mole, under direct orders to ensure Laurent's misery and helplessness through any means necessary. “Innocent bystander or not, you cannot expect me to believe you are revealing your hand for my own benefit.”

Another coy half-smile. “Damen would not think to question the devotion of those he keeps close. Perhaps I want to see where your loyalties lie.”

Laurent can't help but bark out a harsh laugh, at that. “Not with the prince, I can promise you that much. Not with anyone in this barbaric country.”

“I was hoping as much,” she says and her smirk widens, blue eyes glittering.

Before Laurent can press for future information, there is a gentle knock on the door, followed by a soft cough from beyond it-- too soft to be the prince returning to his chambers, much to Laurent's relief, likely a servant of sorts. The woman does not acknowledge it, and for a moment Laurent thinks she won't-- content to keep the servant waiting in order to continue her interrogation. But, after letting her cold gaze linger on him a moment longer, she turns on her heel and sashays out of the room, pushing past the startled, prostrated slave waiting outside the door.

Once the noblewoman’s echoing steps have faded, the girl peeks her head up, and then stands to face him. She's dressed as he is, another bed slave, in airy sheer silks tied artfully around her waist, her breasts hanging bare. Laurent feels vaguely that he should be scandalized by the display, but can't be bothered to muster up outrage on top of everything else he's already facing. He notes bitterly that she, too, shares his coloring-- blonde hair, blue eyes, fair skin-- good to see that the prince's fetishism transcends the boundaries of social class.

“Exalted master Damianos wishes for you to entertain him in the gardens,” she says, an excited lilt to her voice. Laurent can barely hide his disgust at the prospect, but she takes no notice of it. “You won’t know the way yet-- I’ll show you. Come with me.”

 

The slave girl-- he thinks of her as a girl in her innocence, but the shape of her face and the full swell of her hips and breasts are those of a woman, his age if not a few years older-- walks like a bashful dancer through the halls of the palace, gaze lowered and strides airy and graceful, even in the absence of any eyes besides other slaves’, besides Laurent's. He tries his best to mimic her movements, head down and steps light, but the moment they are alone he drops the act and resumes counting doorways.

She has taken him two-hundred-thirty-four steps away from the prince's chambers, down three flights of steps and past three left turns, two right. Laurent guesses that these are slave passages, narrow and winding, carved into the rock itself and without ornamentation, built so that servants may come and go as unobtrusively as possible. And, if these are anything like those in Arles, which they would be if the Akielons had any sense whatsoever, somewhere in the labyrinth is an escape route known only to the royal family, should the palace ever be sieged. If he can find it, it will be his clearest way out.

The girl seems to notice that he has broken form, one blue eye glancing up from behind her blonde waves, and he hastily resumes his slavelike hunched posture, lest she think him more suspicious than she likely already does. To his surprise, she only giggles in response, girlish and demure.

“You are Exalted master Damen's new favorite, aren't you?” Her voice is melodic, even with the brutal Akielon words, and he cannot glean anything malicious behind the simple joy in her expression. In Vere, a new pet could easily be attacked by an established one for stealing a contract, but he supposes that particular conflict is avoided when none of the pets have any choice in the matter.

He notes her use of the diminutive, as Jokaste had, and as Damianos had requested of him last night. “I am a gift for the Prince from the new King of Vere. Whether or not he favors me, I have not known him long enough to say.”

He is reasonably certain that that is the proper response; humble and reverent of the idiot prince, and noncommittal enough to warrant a change in conversation, but it only serves to elicit more giggles. “He sent me for you, he wants to see you in the gardens. Of course he favors you. My name is Lykaios; he favors me also.”

Laurent chooses his words cautiously, to keep the offense he feels in his throat from appearing on his tongue. “Where I am from, men pleasure men and women pleasure women, and the two do not mix outside of marriage. And generally, a courtier will only keep one favorite at a time.”

“That sounds terribly rigid, if you don't mind my saying so. Master Damen has many favorites-- men, women, some who are neither-- and he loves us all well and cares for us kindly,” she says with a small, finalizing nod that makes Laurent want to narrow his eyes. This is what he's been forced to contend with, this-- barbaric brainwashing of people into thinking that being kept as an inhuman bed toy is anything _kind_.

The girl, Lykaios, must notice his silence, if not the careful neutrality of his expression, because she furrows her golden brows. “He has not made love to you, yet? All he could speak of was your beauty.”

It's starting to become quite exasperating, how that seems to be the first question on everybody's lips. But Laurent supposes a bed slave that won't fuck is just as odd as a slaveowner who won't just hold a slave down and take what they want. “Prince Damianos, in all his infinite kindness, decided me too tired from the journey to bed last night.”

“Oh, that's a shame. I certainly hope you're feeling better tonight,” she says with genuine concern, and it's all he can do to keep his face straight.

“Quite,” is all he manages, in a tone that he hopes suggests the end of such discussion.

It works, for a while; Lykaios remains silent as they take a left turn, and then two right. But then her melodic voice rings out again, jarring to his ears, “Lady Jokaste said you are a prince.”

Laurent's heartbeat freezes momentarily. Naturally, the Akielons wouldn't think to make sure their slaves were out of earshot before discussing political secrets-- wouldn't think them capable of subterfuge, of betraying their masters. Back home, a pet would have to grapple with a reputation of being untrustworthy, but particularly juicy dirt on a patron could be worth it.

He lets out a carefully-crafted derisive snort, voice filled with all the disbelief he can muster without overdoing it. “I am a slave, I am no more a prince than you are a princess. I am named for one, Crown Prince Auguste, whom Master Damianos struck down in glorious battle--” he tries to stave off the sarcastic edge in his tone, “Perhaps that is what you heard the Lady speak of.”

“Perhaps your Akielon is not as good as you believe,” she says gently, with more wit than he would have expected from her. Perhaps he is just as bad as these barbarians, when it comes to underestimating their slaves. “She spoke to you like you were highborn, I heard so.”

“Very well, let's suppose I am a prince,” he says with a strong note of incredulity. More and more, he is finding that the truth makes for a better unbelievable story than any he could come up with. “I am still a slave, with no kingdom to speak of. My alleged princedom does me very little, here.”

“You could tell Master Damen. He is very kind, and he does favor you. I'm sure he would help.”

He is able to meet that with a very genuine bitter snort of laughter. “Master Damen has already slain one Prince Auguste, I'd rather not give him a reason to do so again. How, pray tell, would he be inclined to _help_.”

“I told you, he finds you beautiful, and he so enjoys your cleverness. I think, if you were not a slave and of royal blood, that he and you could be wed, like in the tales.”

She says it as though it is the simplest thing in the world, and Laurent almost wretches as soon as the soft words leave her mouth. This is-- it's all wrong. He had expected pain, had braced himself for torture and fear and all manner of indignity and this-- this _humiliation_ , is more than he can stand.

He can feel his face burning bright red, skin prickling as the slave girl’s smile grows knowingly, as she mistakes his reaction for shyness. He takes a breath, and musters his composure. “Lady Jokaste is mistaken; I am not a prince, I am just a slave, and as likely to marry Prince Damianos as you are.” And when her grin does not fade, “...I would appreciate you not discussing this with the prince.”

Lykaios gives him a small, knowing nod in response that makes his ears burn, and purses her dainty pink lips closed tight. The rest of the walk is done in silence.

 

When they reach the gardens, they find Damianos already occupied. He and another man are seated on a bench together-- not a slave, another noble, though with those damnable bedsheets that kings and commoners wear alike it would be impossible to tell for sure-- embroiled in heavy discussion. Damianos wears a more serious expression than Laurent has seen on him yet, and the other man, similar in age and stature to the prince, speaks quickly to him in grave, hushed tones.

In Vere, a pet might have two choices; to wait out of sight until the conversation had receded, and not risk disrupting a patron’s important business, or to flounce dramatically onto their patron’s lap and disrupt the conversation entirely, in hopes of providing a welcome distraction from unpleasant business. Lykaios, naturally, does neither, and Laurent is forced to follow suit. She approaches the two of them with her usual grace, no mind paid to the gravity of their discussion, and prostrates herself in the grass before them.

They continue as if she is not there, and it is only when Laurent lays himself beside her does the one who is not Damianos take pause.

Though Laurent keeps his head to the ground, he can feel the disdain in the man’s voice. “This is what the Veretians sent you?”

At least someone in this barbaric court has the common sense to be suspicious of him. Damianos, of course, remains as cheerfully oblivious as ever. “I was surprised as well, given their usual lack of taste. He is stunning, isn't he? Lykaios, Auguste, come here.”

Lykaios springs up without hesitation and approaches Damianos, and before she can lower herself again to kiss his feet, the prince scoops her up by the waist and showers her breasts in shameless kisses, each drawing from the girl a chorus of airy giggles.

Laurent, when he can pull his eyes away from such a garish display, glances to the nobleman, who seems equally exasperated with the prince’s behavior, if not for quite the same reasons.

“He is called _Auguste_? You realize they meant this as an insult to you, yes?”

Damianos places his last kiss before setting Lykaios aside and then turning, gut-wrenchingly, to Laurent. His feet lead him to approach the prince, and he can only imagine the sort of grotesque affection that could follow his greeting to Lykaios, but to his surprise, and to his prickling dismay, Damianos only reaches out for his hand, and then, once Laurent obliges out of a lack of excuse to do otherwise, places a chaste kiss to the back of it, as if Laurent were some reticent princess in need of wooing, rather than a slave at the mercy of a wanton glutton of a prince. “If Vere means to insult me by sending me gifts of beautiful men, then I will have no trouble at all weathering their ire,” Damianos says, in some horrendously misguided attempt to be charming.

Very pointedly he looks to the ground, and hopes Damianos and the nobleman mistake the gesture for bashfulness, rather than Laurent avoiding the gleeful twinkle that he knows will be present in Lykaios’s eye. _He and you could be wed, like in the tales_. The lingering sensation of Damianos’s lips on his skin makes him want to vomit.

The nobleman seems just as irritated with the prince’s idling romanticisms, a small morsel of validation that Laurent will happily accept in this backwards court, and he rubs tiredly at his face before standing. “Be careful, is all I ask. Veretians have thirty faces, even the slaves, and daggers hidden in every fold of their clothing.”

“I don’t need to trust him in order to admire him, Nikandros,” Damianos replies, not bothering to interrupt the long, indulgent look he is currently dragging over Laurent’s body. Laurent doesn’t know whether to be dully surprised that the idiot prince knows enough of basic subterfuge not to trust those who serve him, or entirely unsurprised that he is still stupid enough to admit as such in front of those he holds in suspicion. _You have not given me enough clothing to hide even a butter knife_ , he wants to say, but holds his tongue in silence. While Damianos might, infuriatingly, delight in his barbs, he doubts the same is true for the rest of the court of Akeilos.

Nikandros, assumedly so used to the prince’s dense behavior that the admission doesn’t even register as admonishable, responds with a brief smile and a fraternal slap on the shoulder. “Enjoy him, then, friend. Some of us actually _attend_ our meetings.”

He straightens his bedsheets, and leaves with a familiar bow of his head, which Damianos responds to in kind. Then, he and Lykaios are left alone with the prince.

Lykaios has made herself busy perched beside Damianos on the stone bench, gently nuzzling his bare shoulder with her cheek and placing soft kisses against his skin. Laurent is left to stand lamely where he was beckoned before the prince, unable to force himself into performing such mundane acts of servile affection and untrained in what would be appropriate besides. Were this still Vere, he could suck the prince off in the garden without turning any heads, but Akeilons, thankfully, tend more towards discretion.

Damianos does not seem to mind his reticence, or even notice it, idiot that he is. “Lykaios, did you know,” he says as he takes another languid look down Laurent’s body, absently reaching up to cup the girl’s cheek, like a cat’s, “that in Vere, it is the slaves who eat food from their masters’ hands?”

Lykaios responds with a noise of mild interest, not pausing in her nuzzling. “Truly, Master Damen? How strange.”

“Auguste told me of the tradition last night. It was quite strange, but enjoyable enough-- I would like to try it again, with the three of you.” He runs a finger down the girl’s jaw, and pulls her into a lazy kiss that she seems to take as a dismissal, leisurely beginning to disentangle herself from the prince. A knot of anxiety forms in Laurent’s stomach. “Fetch us a platter from the kitchens, enough for all of us, wouldn’t you, sweetheart? Tell them to take their time with it; we're certainly in no hurry.”

Lykaios dances off, managing to slip Laurent a sly grin as she passes, which only serves to sow further knots of unease. He is left alone with Damianos.

“There is something I want from you. Is this how your game is played, in Vere?”

Laurent’s insides turn. “A pet makes a request of a patron, not the other way around. But I am not a pet, I am a slave, and you may have anything you wish of me. Master Damianos.”

Damianos only laughs in response. “I have never met a slave more insistent on upholding the standards of his role when they are in conflict with his master’s request. You are scared, Auguste, I know, but you will not be hurt here. I am kind.”

Laurent opts to stay silent, because he can’t imagine himself opening his mouth right now and anything coming out that isn’t a scream.

Damianos, imbecile that he is, is unphased. “My request is this: the Veretian delegation will depart in five days’ time. Prior to their departure, there will be a banquet in their honor. I would like for you to accompany me to that banquet, to serve me personally in a position of honor as a final farewell to your people. What are your terms?”

“I am your slave; request my accompaniment and it is yours, with very little decision on my end. Allowing me to establish the terms for my own servitude does little to lessen the vulgarity of it.”

“There has been nothing vulgar about your servitude thus far, Auguste, and I shall see to it that it remains that way.” Laurent listens for any sign of impatience in the prince’s response, any sign that he might be close to toeing the line of what Akeilon royalty will tolerate from an uppity Veretian slave who won’t even fuck, but, infuriatingly, there is nothing in his tone but more damned gentle concern.

“This entire country is vulgar, the fact that I am standing in the royal gardens wearing little but a _napkin_ is vulgar.”

His ferocity only seems to charm Damianos, who snorts, one cheek curling into a delighted smile. “Is that your request, then? Shall I send for traditional Veretian clothing, in exchange your accompaniment to the banquet?”

 _Yes!_ is what Laurent wants to scream; he wants to be covered head to toe in heavy cloth and laced in so that his body is his own, wants Damianos and Jokaste and everyone else’s assessing gazes to be blocked by a cold wall of blue damask, wants to be shapeless and sexless so that someone in this damned country might pay attention to his words instead of his body.

But no. His mind would not allow such a frivolous request, not when it could be better spent on a tactical advantage. _You will endure, it is nothing you have not already endured_. He takes a deep breath, steadying his voice to something almost demure.

“Tell me, _master_ , does the Akeilon palace have a library?”

That, apparently, was a question Damianos did not expect, judging by the way his eyebrows raise, but his smile persists. “Do all Veretian pets know how to read?”

“It was a… pleasure, of my former master’s, to see his pets educated in order to better flaunt us at court.” Another half-truth in place of a lie. His uncle had always valued education, if not always basic human decency. “Reading has become a comfort of mine.”

With no further questioning, not an ounce of suspicion, Damianos holds out his hand to Laurent. “It shall be done, then. You will be granted full access to the palace library, and in return, you will serve me at the Veretian’s farewell banquet. Is this to your liking?”

Laurent forces himself to exhale, and to nod, and to lift his hand and touch it to Damianos’s and to shake it, except the prince apparently has other ideas. He closes his hand around Laurent’s, and for a brief, panicked moment, Laurent envisions himself being pulled forward, into the prince’s lap, to his knees, worse-- but no.

Damianos turns Laurent’s hand over in his, and presses his lips to the cold skin of Laurent’s palm, a reprise of his earlier gesture. And yet, not quite the same. Something... shifts in it’s meaning, something that Laurent cannot quite place, but pushes it from his mind, instead steeling his face to hide his grimace and enduring the affection.

When it is over-- and it is over quickly, another small victory-- and Laurent has withdrawn his hand with the feeling of Damianos’s lips cupped hatefully within in it, the Prince gives him another long, leisurely look, and then a nod. “I am looking forward to it, Auguste.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOO BOY BET YOU DIDN'T EXPECT THIS THING TO UPDATE
> 
> Tbh 75% of this has been in my docs since July but the wordcount was just a hair short of the first chapter and I felt bad making y'all wait so long for something short SO NATURALLY I WAITED FOR ANOTHER SIX MONTHS BEFORE FINISHING THE DAMN THING WHOOPS
> 
> I think I'm the first person in the capri fandom to ever write Lykaios


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